A la Uruguaya

[airiefairie]

http://www.fraserinstitute.org/uploadedFiles/fraser-ca/Content/research-news/research/publications/towards-a-worldwide-index-of-human-freedom.pdf

The latest Personal Freedom Index ranking shows some interesting surprises. For instance, one could conclude that it is unfortunate that only three and a half million people live in a country like Uruguay

Comments

[sealwhiskers]

Interesting article, but their measurement on "Freedom" is highly ideological, and they openly admit that in the text. So, I'll have to say that this "study" is scientifically not worth much, unless you want to study how a certain ideology measures freedom. It hardly tells anything at all about the actual conditions in these countries compared to each other.

[airiefairie]

That may well be the case. Meanwhile, other indicators that are not a result of this research, firmly put Uruguay in the top 3 (and in many respects on the top position) in the entire South American continent

[sealwhiskers]

I am not doubting the results, or what you say, I was just struck by the sheer and flamboyant ideological bias in the method presesented in the equality research, and how they define "freedom". They are very open with it too, they list what political ideologists count and how. The study is entirely based on the perspective of a few historical/political names.

This is not criticism of your post, and I do not need a list of other research. But I did sit down and read that whole thing, and found it highly note worthy.

[airiefairie]

Sorry for the link spam...

[sealwhiskers]

No worries, I don't mind them, but as I didn't disagree with anything in your article, it wasn't striclty needed. I do trust the methods in most of these other studies a little more however, on account of the detail I brouight up. I do think that political bias messes with studies in the long run. Not necessarily with the immediate results, but with the correlation between different results, if that makes sense.

[the_rukh]

"This project focuses on creating a comprehensive index of human freedom, which includes economic freedom and is based on the “negative” definition of freedom-in other words, the absence of barriers
or coercion that prevent individuals from acting as they might wish."

As you said, lots of Americans, mainly to the right, would consider this a very socialist opinion of freedom. The idea of including economic freedom as freedom would cause heads on the right to pop.